Asexuality and Islam

Across a series of recent posts, I explored whether it is possible to have a celibate marriage within the framework of marriage in Islam, the obstacles an asexual Muslim may face in securing for themselves such a marriage, and a possible way forward.

Why bother? If an asexual Muslim wants to have a non-sexual relationship with a person of a different assigned sex*, why try to fit it into the box of marriage?

For one thing, marriage in a civil context brings a package of legal benefits that are not obtainable any other way, and asexuals may want to obtain these benefits. Asexuals, including aromantic and wtfromantic asexuals, can and have gotten married. People who are getting married for the civil benefits, and who are observant Muslims, might wish to have a religious marriage along with a civil one.

There are also some benefits, within the context of living one's life according to the rules of Islam, to a purely religious marriage.

The most obvious of these are financial benefits. A husband and wife inherit from each other if the other spouse dies. Additionally, the husband is obligated to provide the wife with a bride-gift (mahr) upon the marriage (Quran 4:24; according to Quran 2:237, she is entitled to keep half even if the marriage is never consummated), to provide complete financial support (maintenance) during the marriage** (Quran 4:34), and to provide a gift (mat'a) upon divorce (Quran 2:241). The financial benefits for a woman may thus be substantial. (As a side note, it is the husband's expenditure on his wife that is stated in 4:34 as the reason he gets greater power within the marriage, a topic I discuss at length here.)

The second set of benefits relates to the regulation of social interaction, specifically between men and women who are not related to each other, that observant Muslims typically try to adhere to.

According to traditional Islamic guidelines, a man and woman who are not related to each other should not be alone together in private, they should not engage in unnecessary physical contact (according to the strict rule followed by many devout Muslims, even shaking hands is strongly discouraged), they should lower their gazes around each other, and they should dress modestly (the woman's hijab or headscarf is thus part of a much larger code of conduct whose rules are nearly identical for both men and women, except in the specific form of modest dress).

Because of these rules, if we imagine an asexual man and woman who wish to have a queerplatonic (non-sexual, non-romantic) relationship but they would like to share a residence, be comfortable around each other, and perhaps engage in cuddling in private and holding hands in public, according to the orthodox rules of interaction, they would not be able to do this unless they were married to each other. Yes, these rules are very strict.

The regulation of social interaction is intended to guard against illegal sexual intercourse, and some of the rules will sometimes grant an exemption where sexual desire is not present (this is most commonly encountered in the discussion of shaking hands). One might argue based on this principle that asexuals do not need to adhere to those rules that are predicated on the assumption that they experience sexual desire (there are still some rules they might choose to follow, such as hijab, given that others may experience sexual desire towards them).

Nonetheless, if they wish to uphold the community standards in this area, or if they don't wish to have to explain their asexuality all the time (or indeed if they do not wish to disclose it at all), then marriage provides a way to legitimize a queerplatonic relationship under Islamic social guidelines.

To sum up, then, an asexual woman and man who have a non-sexual relationship such as a queerplatonic relationship may wish to seek a religious marriage for several reasons, including upholding Islamic guidelines on social interaction, financial benefits, or religious recognition of a marriage made to obtain civil benefits. My arguments in support of making celibate marriages within the Islamic framework are intended to make a space for the religious legitimation of such non-normative relationship types for the benefit of asexual Muslims.

*Because orthodox Islam does not support same-sex marriage, I have limited the discussion in this post to cross-sex relationships in order to explore how these, specifically, can be legitimized under orthodox rules.

**According to some traditional interpretations, if the wife is in a state of recalcitrance (nushuz), the husband is not obligated to provide maintenance. However, the Quran rejects this reasoning in 4:19 and 65:1. As and when this rule is followed, it makes the situation of the recalcitrant asexual wife even more dire. This is why the ace-positive framework I have proposed is so essential.